The Complete Keyboard Concertos - Volume 5

Abstract

Why play these concertos on the fortepiano? In my notes to volume 4 of this series, I already stressed that my choice of different instruments is largely based on personal experiments. At a very early stage of my research into Emanuel Bach's keyboard concertos, I found that some of the pieces sounded excellently on the harpsichord, whilst others did not. In case of the latter, I had to confront the following problems: The harpsichord is a very freely resonating instrument. The ideal texture for it lets the whole body of the instrument resonate. A musical texture which does not create enough resonances (e.g. when the upper voice and the bass are too far apart) might point to a different kind of instrument. The heading 'Cembalo' on a keyboard part does not necessarily mean that it was intended for the instrument we nowadays call the harpsichord. In most cases con temporary terminology did not differentiate between keyboard instruments with an action plucking the strings (the harpsichord family) or striking them (the different kinds of fortepiano) or any combination of both. During the entire 18th century, words such as 'cembalo', 'Fliigel' or 'clavecin' were freely used to denote all of these. Problematic dynamic marks: the A major concerto on the present disc is the first one among C.P.E. Bach's concertos to contain a pianissimo marking in the keyboard part (bar 49 in the first movement), although this is not possible on the harpsi¬chord. Pianissimo occurs in some later concertos, too, and in the so called Sonatinas even mezzoforte and fortissimo are to be found. I know of no harpsichord on which such dynamic shadings wrould be realizable. The A major concerto was composed in 1746. Would it suggest a direct connection to the new Silbermann fortepianos of the court? Left hand accompaniment often dominating against the solistic right hand part when played on the harpsichord. On the other hand, many other early concertos re¬tain a perfect balance between the voices, making a performance on the harpsi¬chord reasonable. On many early fortepianos, including those of Silbermann, the raising of the dampers could be achieved by means of hand-stops. (The Silbermann instruments have two knobs on both sides of the clavier for raising the dampers of the descant and bass.) This 'pedal effect' could therefore only be used for longer sections, with the result that all the notes in that section are sustained. In the early years of the fortepiano, this effect was regarded as sensational. It is required for the broken chord figures towards the middle of the last movement of the D major concerto and could be also used at several places in the A major work on this disc. In Bach's later revisions of the concertos, changes in the keyboard texture are often in favour of the fortepiano.